Transformers Reviews

Ratchet

June 4, 2008 3:06 am Ryan Animated, Deluxe, Toy Reviews

Alright, protoforms, listen up. It’s time to do a review on Animated Ratchet, so tune your sensors in, ’cause he’s not gonna let me do this twice.

In vehicle mode, Ratched is… disappointingly tiny. He’s about the same size as Bumblebee, and that just isn’t right. Ambulances should be a bit bigger than a puny yellow compact. But moving past that, he’s actually pretty nice in vehicle mode. He’s got sleek lines, fairly complete paint applications in the necessary red and white scheme, and pretty good proportions. Like all of the Animated figures, he’s definitely got the Animated style down pat, so it’s a fairly simplistic/cartoony vehicle mode, but that suits me just fine.

Transformation from Cranky Ambulance to Robot

Fold up the skirting between the wheels on both sides.
Rotate the rear section of roof up about 90 degrees, then slide it forward so that it sits on top of the rest of the roof.
Extend both arms, then pop them out and forward. Rotate them to hang down beside the windshield.
Swing the legs down, and separate them. Unfold the feet.
Slide both roof sections back, allowing the head to pop out over the windshield. Fit them against the back.
Bend the hood/bumper section down. Pose him, but careful. Those servos have been in wars, kid.

Not bad for a bot with a servo in the scrapheap, eh? He came out impressively close to the animation model. The only colouring problems I have are the wrong colour Autobrand on his chest (seems to be a trend with the line), and the lack of paint in his wound (which wouldn’t be practical, anyways). They remembered his broken crest, the dings on his face, and I could almost swear they even made the head asymmetrical. Wow. He’s a joy to play with, with lots of joints, no problems with them (a strike against show accuracy, I know!) to mention, and an assortment of accessories to play around with. Each arm has half of his magnets as a spring loaded weapon (full tools would have been nice), and he comes with four tools that store in his backpack in robot mode (but nowhere in vehicle mode) - a hammer, a wrench, what I think is a welding/zapping tool thing from the show, and a bottle or can opener (I don’t use either of those things enough to know which).

Articulation Breakdown (it happens at his age)

Head - ball joint with very limited up/down movement
Arms - Double swivel shoulders (one ratcheted), double swivel elbows, swivel fingers (one block), swivel thumb
Legs - Double swivel hips, double swivel knees (although one of them would be quite painful for a human to use), swivel feet

Score

Deco: Rating: . Really, it’s bang on. If only Movie Ratchet had got this kind of treatment the first time around.
Posability: Rating: . He’s got more posability than he deserves. He’s right up there with Prowl or Prime, so don’t let his age fool you.
Transformation: Rating: . It’s a nice, deceptively simple transformation, but that bit at the end with getting his legs and gut into place doesn’t seem to sit right for me. I wish there was something more holding the legs in place/less sticking when collapsing the hood, but it seems to work fine in the end.
Badassery: [3.5/5]. Ratchet’s not really supposed to be “badass”, but he’s got that nifty bottle opener. Probably more useful than the jaws of life, I suppose.
Vehicle Mode: Rating: . It’s perfect. Yeah, bumping size classes would have been nice to get him further from Bumblebee, but it’d probably be too far.
Robot Mode: Rating: . It’s amazing. Tons of details from the animation model, tons of play value, he’s just awesome.

Overall, Overall Rating: . He’s one of the line’s “must have” items, in my opinion. I strongly recommend him, even though it feels like I’ve done that for almost every Animated figure so far.

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